Ride the Wave

Photo credit: Christoffer Engstrom – Unsplash

“If the current takes you under, don’t panic – knees to chest, hold them tight, just be still, resist the fight. The current will bring you back up, and it will be alright.”

With bulging eyes, clearly taken aback at how rapidly the intro to water rafting took an ominous turn (from “Welcome, we’re going to have some fun on the water today, oh yeah, and if the current takes you under…,” in an impressively quick amount of time), I tried to focus on the guide’s imperatives… while also wondering if he meant to rhyme like he did.

And then we took off – our rafting-guide-turned-poet, and a raft full of gaggling teens rafting in the waves somewhere between here and Tennessee (my memory’s a bit spotty on that part – but the memory of the raft? Spot on… at least I think). It is quite possible that this is not exactly as it went down – as every time we retrieve a memory it is vulnerable to being changed and I, a brain doc, am not even immune to this; surely the memory has possibly morphed over time. My point being, that this memory of daunting pre-rafting guidance has turned into words of wisdom that I think about more often than I would have anticipated.

Like last night, for example.

You know those weeks where, despite your best efforts to anticipate, plan, prepare, and – okay, I’ll just come out and say it – control everything, very little actually goes to plan, and it feels like the more tightly you try to control things the more they unravel?

… Like when you tidy up the toys, clean the floors, and then the dog runs inside, skidding across the floor with muddy paws because the neighbor’s sprinkler is glitchy and got your yard all muddy and your dog decided to roll around in it?

… Or when your kiddo gets their first daycare sickness with fever and all, in the evening, after the pediatrician’s office is closed, so you go to consult Dr. Google only to realize the internet is out… for your entire area… so you switch to cell data… which somehow is super glitchy, so Dr. Google is out, and you adjust course – sending texts to mom and your best-friend-who-just-so-happens-to-be-a-baby-expert from a specific corner of the house that has even spotty (at best) cell service, and actually reading through the pediatrics textbook you bought (yes, yes, of course I bought one), only to realize that the only hope of keeping your little one calm, happy, and cool is likely indulging in some cartoon time (Bluey and Coco to the rescue), only to realize that’s not possible because of the whole internet and cell service situation you’ve got going on, the DVD player was never unpacked, the downloaded Coco episodes you had on the iPad “expired” (apparently Netflix downloads expire – who knew?), and the fancy new laptops you have don’t have CD/DVD drives. (And, yes, that was a run-on sentence by design, because that’s how it felt in the moment as it all unwinded last night). You know, just another weekday night, right?

Later that night, when my sweet little boy was sound asleep, I sat down on the ground to tuck in my fluffy goldendoodle, Fitz – to give him his Goodnight Biscuit and his Midnight Dessert Snack (yes, 2 treats, every night – he is that good of a boy). And I sat there a bit longer than usual, and I reflected on the wildness of the evening.

If you’re thinking, “Oh of course you did – mindful reflecting is an important part of well-being.” Well, then I’m sorry to inform you this was not intentional.

To be real, the internet was still out, cell service was still spotty, my husband was busy strategizing his upcoming fantasy football draft, and the book I’m “reading” (aka, have laid eyes on the first five pages of before putting a bookmark in it weeks ago) just wasn’t drawing me in.

… so I sat on the ground, petting The Fitz… and I thought.

Apparently, I thought of the wise rafting guide’s words from half a lifetime ago (though, to be clear, who knows if he was actually wise, but his words – or at least what I recall him saying years later – were pretty insightful).

“If the current takes you under, don’t panic – knees to chest, hold them tight, just be still, resist the fight. The current will bring you back up, and it will be alright.”

I thought of those words and how, whether or not they are sound rafting advice (that, I don’t know), they are pretty spot on for rolling with the riptides and choppy waves of life that tend to sneak up on us…

… when we are distracted by all-of-the-things we are trying to control, forgetting that seasons and conditions change without any doing of our own, no matter how hard we try to make that not be the case.

… or, like last night, when it’s past pediatrician office hours, there’s no internet or cell service, and you’ve got a sick kiddo who just wants some Bluey (to be fair, this mama really wanted some Bluey, too).

I realized how my thoughts earlier in the night had focused on how to prevent this same exact scenario from happening again. You know, “reasonable things” considering how unlikely this would be – like downloading cartoons to the iPad biweekly so they never expire, charging up batteries and all devices all the time in case next time there’s a power outage on top of everything else, reinstating a landline phone, and so on and so on.

I realized this line of thinking was just adding “busy” work for me and overpreparing, potentially distracting me from other things that are more pressing. It felt like the smash-the-crocodile game at the arcade (or was it a hippo, or alligator? I’m not quite as confident in this memory… but you know the one), where you’re so busy fighting off whatever animal that keeps popping up that you get distracted away from the others popping up all over the place.

… or like when I was a kid at the beach in Florida, so distracted by the pigeon that was trying to steal my hot dog that I wouldn’t have necessarily seen if I was getting close to the waves (to be clear, there was never any danger there – my parents have eagle eyes, so while I was oblivious to all but that gosh darn pigeon and my yummy hotdog, they indeed were not, and even a drop of water remained yards and yards away from this hungry little girl protecting her hotdog from the birds. Also, if you’ve noticed a lot of my stories involve food… you’re not wrong).

I realized that by stewing over and trying to prevent last night’s exact occurrence from happening again, I would be fighting the current, wearing myself out unnecessarily, when in fact riding the wave, going with the flow, adjusting when needed, and being still when required, would be the better option.

I thought of this all while sitting there petting The Fitz.

… and I realized I was doing it – following the rafting guide’s sage advice: sitting there, not panicking, knees to chest (as I usually do when petting The Fitz), holding on tight (to the Fitz – I mean who can resist his sweet fluffy puppy dog hugs), just being still, resisting the fight (the urge to anticipate and overcomplicate), allowing the current (circumstances out of my control) to bring me back up (and out of the overthinking mind) – ultimately trusting it will be alright.

I realized this wasn’t the first time I have followed his advice.

I thought back to other situations over the years where things have come together all at once – riptides and currents throwing me off my balance, usually with me initially trying to reach for the surface on my own accord, only to realize that being still and holding tight (usually while petting the Fitz) was usually the best route up.

… and then I said, “Hmmm, that’s interesting,” out loud – which my husband didn’t think was unusual at all. Often times these musings happen all in my mind and culminate in me saying, “Hmmm, that’s interesting,” or something to that effect out loud… in which he asks me about it, and I tell him, and he says, “You should write about that,” and I say, “Maybe I will…. tomorrow….”

… but this time I actually did.

And – in case you’re wondering – since the small riptide of last night, the ship has righted, the fever has broke, the internet (obviously) and cell service have returned (hello, world!)…

… but I am still sitting tight, being still.

… because the rafting guide was right – the current brought me back up without any doing of my own.